As a nurse in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU), Deirdre Kirkwood cares for babies who weigh as little as two pounds and who are so sick they can’t breathe on their own. These fragile children are hooked up to highly specialized equipment, tubes and monitors. NICU nurses such as Kirkwood not only care for these babies but also counsel and educate worried parents.

Kirkwood loves her job as a NICU nurse at Parkview Community Hospital in Riverside, Calif., east of Los Angeles. So it's natural, as a strong nurse and patient advocate, she joined with co-workers in their efforts to form a union with United Nurses Associations of California/Union of Health Care Professionals, an affiliate of AFSCME.

Then, late on a Friday afternoon, the hospital’s human resources manager called Kirkwood into a meeting, presented her with her last paycheck and fired her for “poor morale.” A well-respected, seven-year nurse with a spotless performance record, Kirkwood was incredulous. Poor morale hardly describes Kirkwood, who spearheaded the department's holiday gift-giving to managers! 

“I am going to fight for my job back,” Kirkwood says. She is encouraging her co-workers not to give up on their efforts to form a union. “Please choose courage over fear,” she implores them. “The most important thing you can do now is learn more about what it means to form a union, sign a union card and vote ‘Yes’ once the election occurs.”

Hospital management has aggressively opposed the nurses’ campaign and tried to intimidate union supporters. When Kirkwood, her family and friends went to Parkview to hand out fliers telling her story to fellow employees, police cars showed up to expel them. Three administrators tried to crash a private organizing meeting held by the nurses at a local church. When union supporters leafleted at the hospital, administrators turned on the sprinklers full-blast.

Kirkwood and her co-workers continue surmounting these obstacles and fighting for a union at their workplace. If the Employee Free Choice Act was law, employers such as Parkview would face stiffer penalties for their behavior, and nurses such as Kirkwood would not have to risk their careers to stand up for their patients and communities.